Lakeway Center Affected by Closing of The Market

The closing of The Market has brought less customer traffic to Lakeway Center. The Market, a local and natural food store, closed in early 2014 and the loss is making business slower for the surviving stores in the center.  

 The Markets L.L.C. announced in a press release on Dec. 12, 2013 that the Lakeway store would close because the store was not bringing in enough business.

“People really showed up at The Market when the closing sales started,” Michaela Davis said, employee at Emerald City Smoothie. However, the cheaper prices and the overall closing of the store may have attracted an unwanted crowd that is harassing other customers.

“It has been slower around here and there has also been a change in the type of customers coming here,” Davis said. “I don’t want to say “sketchy”, but some of the people who hang around the stores can be questionable.”

In January, when The Market was having its closing sales, Emerald City Smoothie employee Jennifer Gonzales also noticed a change in the crowd coming to Lakeway Center.

Police were called to Lakeway Center at least two times in January because of a man harassing people outside of Emerald City Smoothie. Another call to police was about a man who entered the smoothie store insulting a man for being a homosexual, Gonzales said.

There has been an increase in police patrol in the area, Gonzales said. There are sometimes creepy guys walking around at night and I usually see a cop walking around too, she said.

Because of the harassment issues, David said she is afraid when she is working alone in the store at night.

Other businesses in the shopping center relied on the customer traffic brought in by The Market and are impacted by the loss of the store.

The biggest change around here is the lack of foot traffic we get in our store, Galen LeBlanc said, Radio Shack employee. It is most definitely slower here, he said.

The center is a lot quieter during the day without all of the shoppers coming in and out of the grocery store, LeBlanc said.

Popular with college students, Crazy Mike’s Video still gets as many customers as it had before The Market closed, Kevin Lindsay said, Crazy Mike’s employee.

Busier stores, like the movie rental, are not experiencing a decline in customers but notice a decline in traffic to Lakeway Center, he said.

“There is definitely a lot more parking than there used to be,” Lindsay said, employee at Crazy Mike’s Video. “The parking lot used to be full and now it is not even close.”

More people shopped at Fred Meyer than The Market since Fred Meyer is cheaper than The Market’s expensive organic food, Lindsay said.

The Market at Lakeway closed shortly after the remodeling of Fred Meyer on Lincoln Street. The Sunset Costcutter, another The Markets L.L.C. store closed after the addition of Winco on Meridian, a store that also offers lower prices.

The Lakeway location was the last Market store in Bellingham after the Sunset location closed in 2013.